Littleacornman's poker n life blog

The highs n lows of a winning low stakes Sng player

Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Does your Mom know...

I played twelve $22's yesterday and they didn't go well.I did run like crap, but I also blame myself for letting that affect my game.I didn't tilt but I did play too many bubble situations like a weak fish and didn't make the pushes required to gain a commanding chip lead.( being card dead is no excuse)

At 6pm I picked up Step A and her pal and took them for a Mc'ds.Her Dad told me that Step A hasn't been at school for the last two weeks and there's talk of social services and children's panels.She's now talking about doing her 4th year all over again when she moves down South in June.Hopefully she will buckle down when she moves and can fulfil her potential.

I also tried to give her advice on dealing with the police last night as her and her friends have been stopped a few times when hanging about in groups outside.Always be polite,never be cheeky to them and don't give them any excuses to lock you up with bigger harder neds/chavs than you'll ever want to meet!Her pal mentioned she'd asked a police woman if she could try on her hat.I don't think I'd ever have dared be that cheeky if confronted by the police when I was a kid.Ahh the youth of today!

It wasn't all lectures about the police and sticking in at school.I'm now a world renowned expert at the game of "yellow car,double hit,no hitbacks" which is like playing tig ( or tag) whenever a yellow car is spotted.I'm not sure it's possible to multi-table tig online though....

Today's plan is to order Moses basket for my sisters upcoming baby in June and hit the tables and Modern Warfare 2 later.My Mum also called to say I can have their old leather suite when they get a new one in a few weeks.That should certainly be better for my back than the old one I'm using just now.

Righty,here's a screenshot from the chatroulette site which made me laugh.I did use the site quite a bit towards the end of last year before quickly growing bored of video chatting to random strangers.This kid pwns though!

Monday, March 29, 2010

Monday update

My manager called me today to say to expect a "harsh" letter and not to be overly worried.It's probably because for now I've knocked back the Occupational Health offer from my work to get their Doc to check me out.My own Doc is chasing up the scan for my back and I'm getting physio so I think seeing any other Doc would be a waste of time.I'll see how I feel this time next week and if I'm going to be off any longer I'll agree to meet with the company Doc.

I was too tired to hit the tables last night after a late one on Sat night and getting up to watch the Burnley v Rovers derby.Was it a penalty? No,ney,never! ( or something like that!)

Roll on the new map pack being released for Modern Warfare 2 as I'm getting a bit sick of playing the same old ones.The s-man will be round this evening for some more run and gun shenanigans.

My biggest poker problem for now is still laziness, although I have put in a few thousand more break even Rush hands since my last post.Turbo sngs are still my main game, but it's fun donk leading into preflop raisers and then bluff firing on the turn and river to take down a pot at Rush.I like using the HUD to 3-bet late position openers and generally being more creative than sngs usually permit.

I've just played a set of nine $6.50,45 player turbo's and they really are soft as hell.I managed to cash in two of them for a $32 profit and either later tonight or tomorrow I'm going to try and push myself to put in at least a few sets as volume is the only way to make money in sng's.

Saturday, March 27, 2010

Let's all laugh at Celtc...

The disappointment I felt when Dundee United scored a last minute goal to end our Treble bid on Wednesday night was short lived as our bitter rivals were getting humiliated 4-0 in the league at the same time.Their result leaves us 10 points clear with two games in hand and should just about wrap up our 53rd SPL title.So much for these patheticpre-season predictions from Scottish football journos.

I don't usually bet on horses but Rich reckons Harrison George is a top tip to do well in the 3.10 at Doncaster this afternoon and I've stuck £10 each way on it.It'll probably still be running when you're reading this post...

On the poker front I've played a few $22's at Party and run hot and cold at Rush poker on Full Tilt since my last post.I did take a shot at a $55 tubro yesterday and began it by losing a ton of chips with JJ v QQ.(although at lower stakes I'd probably have tried to get it all in preflop with the Jacks).I managed to fight my way back from that setback and eventually got heads up just as the s-man arrived for another marathon Modern Warfare 2 session.

The villain and I were about even in stacks when I picked up Aces v QQ and with my mind racing ahead to that lovely "You finished in first place and won $248" pop-up,I almost failed to notice the Queen on the turn and another Queen falling on the river just to rub it in! Thankfully I picked up a few hands,got lucky too and it wasn't long before I had the big stack and was able to finish the villain off.

I'm well aware the regardless of the actual result, a return of investment of 5-10% is pretty decent at the $55's and if I played them more often there would be plenty of standard 20 buy-in ( over $1k!) downswings to deal with.At the $22's I don't get too excited about winning or losing a couple of hundred Dollars over a session, but I have to say I did managed a fist pump when I took that $55 down.

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

9 Men,We only need 9 men...

It was great to catch up with The Big Chap last Friday and the s-man,Two Pies and I enjoyed a fine night of Call of Duty and Steven Segal on Saturday night.On Sunday I was at the cup final, which was a dull goalless game until Rangers had two players sent off.St Mirren couldn't take advantage and my team showed why we are Champions by scoring late on to win the League Cup for a record 26th time.

On Monday I was back at the Docs for another 3 week line and I've more physio arranged for tomorrow.

I've been lazy on the poker front and have only played a few sng's and some more Rush poker since my last post.Of course the games are getting tougher and only highly skilled advanced players like myself can extract the maximum value from hands like this....

For anyone unable to see the hand it was probably the easiest money I've ever won at the felt.When the villain donk leads for $4 on a flop like that there's no way he has a set of Kings and I can only guess that he was on monkey tilt when he shoved all in on the turn.Perhaps he expected me to put him on 74 and fold.....

Friday, March 19, 2010

Fools Rush In

Pud mentioned the swings when playing Rush poker in the comments on my last post and I had a nasty one on Monday night when I lost a few big hands/buy-ins in a row.I won't bore you with all the beats other than to say the worst was KK v KJd all in pre flop.I cursed my luck obviously, but don't begrudge Mr KJd his win, afterall those are the type of wins which keep fish like him/her at the tables.

I did manage to recover some of the losses from that nasty night over the course of the week and I still like Rush poker for making me feel like I'm not a complete lazy git when it comes to hitting the tables.As you can probably tell from reading my blog,poker has taken a bit of a backseat over the last few months despite me being off work and having plenty of time to play.Playing a about an hours worth of Rush and logging 300-400 hands feels almost like a cheats way of getting some hand volume logged.

Not much else going on.I did watch a Party poker classic cash game last night and although the coverage may be a few years old, watching Phil Helmuth say "wow" when someone bet $250 preflop seemed a bit lame after watching Durrr make a huge bluff at a half million dollar pot on High Stakes poker.

The Big Chap is popping round today and the s-man will be round for a Sat sesh with the latest Steven Segal film to help me waste another hour and a half of my life I'll never get back!

I'm going to try and lay off the Call of Duty for most of today as my poor wrist hasn't hurt this much since I was a teenager.

Just saw this on a football forum.Got to be the greatest marketing campaign ever...

Ok,thanks for reading and don't forget to register and play in Sunday's Bloggerment on Stars...

Monday, March 15, 2010

Sneezy Game

There was a knock at my door at 4pm on Friday and I was surprised to see Step A and one of her wee friends.We played some COD online,they took Nacho out and about 6-ish I took the pair of them for a Mc'ds.We popped round to see my Mum and Dad afterwards and it was nice to see Step A drop the drinking/smoking teen rebel routine as she shyly covered her snakebite piercings and was full of hugs when my Mum answered the door.She's a great kid and I hope she gets through this tough stage of her life unscathed.

On Saturday night the s-man and Al Eleven were round and we had a good laugh chewing the fat and playing some COD online.Yesterday I watched the Gers draw 3-3 in the cup and made a cash transfer on Stars to my Mum to cover Mothers Day.I dropped the extensively researched and carefully selected card ( yeah,the last one in the garage)round a bit later and also helped my Mum cash in a $3.25,45 player turb.

I picked up Nacho and a Chow Mein on the way home and after walking the boy,I hit up the Bloggerment a few minutes into the game.Despite my fuzzy head and runny nose I actually ran quite well in the game,sucked out a few times and generally luck boxed my way to victory! It was good to get 12 runners ( where were you Dudley?!) and hopefully last week was just a blip and The Bloggerment can get into at least double figures every week.

The Party $22's were calling and after a 2nd and 3rd place finish from 3 games the lure of Rush poker was too much and I opened a 6 max $50 nl table.I've also watched some of Isildur1's over the last few days and just observing him play seems to make me want to take more shots.Playing $50nl with aprox 10 buy-ins ( on Full Tilt) still feels quite nitty when Isildur1 has his whole bankroll spread across 6 Heads Up tables v the worlds best! After dropping nearly a buy-in at $50nl I moved up to $100nl where 1010 holding v AK for a buy-in inspired me to move up further and give $200nl a go.It was only a short 20 min session at that level and after raise/folding with 99 from mid-pos after being reraised to $35 I decided it was time for bed!

According to Pokertracker I've now played over 18k Rush hands and have earned $7.24 per hour.I'll resist moaning about how I've paid nearly $600 in rake and don't get rakeback...!

Friday, March 12, 2010

Take No Prisoners

We had less than a full table turn out for The Bloggerment last Sunday and if the numbers don't improve this week I think it's time to return the tourney to cold storage or look at making it a monthly game.Well done to Bully for taking it down and preventing Gorvacofin winning it for the 18th week in a row...

No posts this week so far as I've played very little poker and a lot more Modern Warfare 2 online.It was great to party up with some 2+2 guys last night and get into some Domination,Sabotage etc instead of the Team Deathmatches I usually play.I don't think I let the team down too badly until the last game ( about 2.30am) by which point I was struggling to keep my eyes open.

I did get over to the s-mans on Tuesday night and had a fine evening however it's a little disheartening that the lump on my back hurt so much afterwards.Last night I headed over to pick Step A up but she'd forgotten we were going out for a Mc'ds and we've rearranged it for tonight.She's also apparently had her snakebite lip piercing done.Her Dad explained that Step A had a "friend" lined up to do the piercing if she wasn't allowed to get it done.Hmmmm!

Anyway the plan for the weekend is to play some MW2 tonight and hopefully catch up with the San Jose Salmon ( now the Connecticut Cod) tomorrow night as he's home on a short visit.

Sunday, March 07, 2010

Riding the Rush

I had a profitable night at the felt last night,winning nearly $400 and it felt good!

I played two sets of six sng's,mixing $6.50 + $12 45 player turbo's and 1300 hands of Rush poker ( mainly at $100nl).I managed to win another $6.50 game in my first set of six turbo's and cashed in a $12 in the other set to leave me scratching my head and wondering why I've never given these soft games more of a chance in the past.I recall playing about twenty 180 player $12 games ages ago without a single cash and being put off by that.I've always preferred the cashing more often for less approach offered by single table sit and go's as regular cashes help keep my poker psyche happy!

I'm definitely still getting to grips with differing payout structures and a few bubble and 9th place ( top 7 pay in 45 player games) finishes make me wonder if I'm pushing a little too hard for the win as I don't play to min cash in these games.The blinds get so high at the final tables that a couple of uncalled shoves with weak hands can quickly move me up a few positions and can give me the momentum to go on and take the game down.( or I look like an idiot for shoving J8!)

After a brief Modern Warfare interlude I hit the Rush tables,starting with 100 hands at $25nl and eventually racking up 450 at $50nl and 730 at $100nl.( all 6 max) I'm not going to count my FT roll as part of my bankroll as I'm far too nitty to take any shots with the rest of my bankroll.

Anyway for once I was the guy with AA v KK and the one busting big hands when I hit flops hard.It wasn't all plain sailing, but poker never is and I was enjoying myself so much I almost had to drag myself to bed just after 5am.

Here's one of my favourite hands of the night ( played at 4.41am so excuse my weird line in the hand!)and a a lesson in how not to play KK.Maybe it's just me but the raising/reraising here is just donktastic!

More COD planned for today before the Bloggerment and probably some more multi-table sng's later...

Saturday, March 06, 2010

The Lunatic is on the Grass

Playing a ton of Modern Warfare 2 has seen the poker take a back seat again over the last few days.In Playstation land there's no money at stake so multi-accounting is quite acceptable and I've now racked up a decent rank as both Stinkyp1nky and GusterBonad.Feel free to drop me a friend request on the PS3 if you're up for some Team Death Matches...

On Thursday after physio I was over visiting my folks and having been bitten by the multi-table sng bug,I encouraged my Mum to get into them and managed to help her to a win at a wee $3.40 ,45 player game.She still wants to play too many easily dominated hands ( like KJ) early in the game, but her game has certainly improved!

Last night after more COD ( Call of Duty) I decided to play a set of six games.Five $6.50's and a $12 game,all 45 player turbo's.I've played thousands of 18 player games, but I'm just starting on the 45/180 player ones and want to get a handle on exactly how they play before playing them for slightly higher stakes.

Anyway in the $12 game I shoved my 5.5k stack in the middle with AJ from the cut-off +1 at 300/600 blinds and a shortstack on the button made a standard call with 66.As the table popped up I noticed the shortstack was US blogger Change100.It was late,I could barely focus on the screen and when I won the coin flip I quickly typed " ul gg" and added " I was pot commited!".I was very wasted and it seemed quite amusing to reference her blog,( called "pot committed") despite me not even being able to spell "committed" by this point!

I can't remember if Change replied "classy" before or after I made the excuse that I was too stoned to spell, but I do recall wishing I'd just said "Hi" and I do hope Change didn't think I was trying to gloat as that's just not the way I roll at the tables or in life.

I only cashed in the $12 game,broke even on the set and hit up the Rush poker tables for a while before bed.Kat's Mammoth rebuy blogger game was tempting however I think I was going to have a whitey if I'd stayed up any longer!

Thursday, March 04, 2010

Nailed

The s-man was over the other night when the Playstation network was down.With no Modern Warfare on offer we watched a couple of movies and even had to make conversation at times...

The first one we watched was a Chanwook Park film, "Oldboy".I was expecting a Liam Neeson "Taken" type film and didn't even realise it was going to be subtitled until it began.It was nothing like "Taken" or any Hollywood movie I've seen and I'd highly recommend it.For a complete change of pace we watched "Bruno" next and although I didn't think it would be much good,it was actually very funny and at times it was hard to spot what was real and what was staged.

"Clock end to return to Arsenal" was one of the sports headlines yesterday as they plan on bringing the old Highbury clock to the Gooners new stadium.I had to laugh at one of the Rangers message boards suggesting a similar "Bell end returns to Spurs" headline when Keanes loan spell at the midden.

Also like this one from the Herald diary:

A reader tells us: “I was driving past Celtic Park this morning and I saw nine season ticket books nailed to the gates and I thought, ‘I’m having them’.“You can never have enough nails."

On the poker front I've come up with another top excuse as to why I've not put in much volume recently.I seem to spend most of the week waiting for a call from my manager at work.Sometimes she is returning my call and at other times I'm simply waiting for her weekly call to check on my progress.I do not want to be in the middle of a set of sng's when the phone rings as it would just be burning money.

I did play some more $6.50,45 player games last night and this time I took a couple down and managed to get my 45 player stats into profit after a horrible run at them during the RaisetheRiver challenge.I was only 4 tabling as I was also watching Scotland win 1-0 v the Czechs in Craig Leveins first game in charge.The $6.50's are incredibly soft and I'll be adding a few more $12's to the mix in my attempt to finally give multi-table sng's a real go.

Just back from physio and it went well with a few more new exercises to keep me stretching the right muscles.Time to hit the COD before Nacho and I head over to visit my folks later.

Wednesday, March 03, 2010

Chop Chop Chop

I was at the Docs again on Monday and have another three week sick line.I've been doing my exercises and my right hand side feels far better.It was heaven to be able to go to sleep on that side again for the first time in months.My back is still sore but I think this will be my last 3 weeks off before looking at some kind of back to work plan.I've been doing my sums and I reckon I can just about afford to cut back to working 4 days per week if my bosses agree to it.

I'll also almost certainly be withdrawing about $2.5k from my poker roll over the next few months to cover the usual football season ticket,Council tax for the year,factor bill,car insurance and MOT+ car servicing.As it stands I'll still be left with around $3k online and that would be enough to pay all next years bigger bills, hopefully with plenty additional poker profit too.I may be a lazy git but part of my in-built work ethic is telling me to stop being so ridiculous,get back to the 5 day grind and be done with it.

Another part of me says that life is too short to spend most of it doing a job I don't enjoy and cutting down on my hours would make it far more tolerable.Of course the poker playing part of me says I should take the years salary on offer and give the poker a real go,however I'm not sure I have the discipline or temperament to play fulltime.I've been off for months now and have hit the felt less often than I usually do, although being on painkillers and feeling low have probably contributed to that lack of volume.Possibly knowing for sure that I had no monthly salary to fall back on would spur me on to grind out the hours but I don't know that for sure.

Anyways that wasn't what this post was supposed to be about! I've been bored out my head over the last few months and decided at the last minute tonight to head out to the local poker club and pay their £20 freezeout tourney.There were only 12 starters and I got off to whatever the opposite of a flyer is when I overplayed AJs on the first hand.We were shorthanded and after I settled down I found that playing live isn't quite as alien as it used to be for me.Online I always feel I have a handle on the usual pokery stuff like hand ranges,bet sizing,position etc but when playing live it was as as if it was all pure guesswork.

This time I was able to see bets which didn't make sense more easily and to be relaxed enough to take in more info and work through it to come to the right conclusion.

I don't recall many hands.The top 4 paid and when the 4th placed guy went out there was me,the other solid player and a guy who had hit two outers three times to amass a huge stack.I chipped up a little before we took a break at 11.45pm and when the bigstack offered an even 3 way chop me and the other guy were happy to take it and I walked away with £75 profit for my first ever live cash.( from a handful of games over the last few years)

Not much of a game report but that's all I've got for now.Back soon...

Monday, March 01, 2010

At Least Barnes Could Rap...

The post title is taken from the banner displayed in the Rangers end after Maurice Edu's injury time winner gave us a ten point lead in the title race.( we still have a game in hand too)

It's just a shame the self named "greatest fans in the world" couldn't resist wrecking the minutes silence for a former Rangers player who died last week or stop themselves from waving Argentina tops and chanting "Argentina" at Falklands veteran Simon Weston when he made a half-time appearance.

After the game I played some more Modern Warfare 2 online and hit the poker tables.I played 15 $6.50 45 player turbo's for a Raisetheriver forum challenge last week and despite running horribly and not cashing once, I could see how juicy the games were.

I've only ever played 18 player or 9 player turbo sng's until now but I picked up on a couple of things over the last few days we which have helped open my mind to multi-table sng's.The first inspiration was a Nick Rainey blog post giving the stats of the best low stakes 180 turbo players in the world over their last 5000 games.In some cases they've made over $30k profit from 5000 games at less than $20 stakes!

As I've rarely played 45/180 player games I didn't realise until last night just how easy it is to multi-table 6 games as they are almost all full 9 seat tables until the final table.When I eventually get round to sorting out table ninja and if I can stand the variance, I reckon I can play at least 8 tables.

I may have to play more poker as I see a bug has hit the Playstation 3 network!Grrr!Back soon..